Page 42 of The Sweetest Chirp

I lean into her hand. “I’ve missed you.”

My gaze locks with my mom’s once more, and I plead with her with my eyes. “Please, Mom. I don’t want Thatcher’s and my issues to come between this family.”

She sighs. “I guess you’re right. I don’t want to end up on that show because I killed my neighbor.”

Maeve snorts. “We’re the ones with the guns.”

“And I know the code to the safe,” Mom throws back, to which everyone chuckles. Mom wraps her arms around me, but then her brows pinch. “Your hair is terrible. Is it box color?”

I snort, but before I can answer her, Thatcher tells her, “She even wore loads of makeup to cover her freckles.”

Mom and Maeve whip their gazes back to me. Mom tsks at me while Maeve chokes out, “No way!”

“Yeah. I was on the run.”

Maeve shakes her head. “We’ll need to get you in with my hairdresser. I’ll see if she has an opening tomorrow.”

I go to decline since I don’t know what we have going on, and I sure as hell can’t have Arwen sitting in a salon, but before I can, my mom pinches my belly. “You have gained weight.” She cups my face. “It’s good weight, though, makes you look more womanly.”

I give her a look. “Did I look like a boy before?”

“I didn’t think so,” Thatcher says, and when I flash him a look, he just grins, that damn hat low on his eyes. Warmth fills my belly, and I have to look away before he can tell.

Mom isn’t impressed with him, asking me, “Where were you? Was the food good?”

I chuckle, nodding. “I worked in a diner. We specialized in a Dutch baby. I ate a few or a hundred,” I say with a shrug, and it’s not a lie. I did eat a lot, and I had an eight-pound baby.

We aren’t there yet, though.

Dad’s brows pull in. “What the hell is a Dutch baby?”

“Think of the size of a stack of pancakes, but it’s only one,” Thatcher explains. “I had three while I was there. Plain, strawberry, and hazelnut.”

“That sounds delicious,” Don says, licking his lips. “I will ask Chef Portia if she knows how to make them.”

Mom cups my jaw and rubs her thumb along my cheek. “Let’s sit. Tell us everything?—”

“Sorry.” At Ingrid’s voice, I freeze in my parents’ arms. I turn to find Ingrid with only her head in the doorway.

“Ingrid, love, come see Audrina,” Maeve tells her, but Ingrid waves her off.

With one hand, she is signing while she speaks, “I already saw her. I tried calling you, Thatcher. Small problem.”

Thatcher and I are moving before she finishes. When we get to the doorway, I find Arwen between her legs, grinning up at us, basically vibrating with excitement.Mommy, Daddy, it’s Ingrid!

I beam down at her, cupping her face.I know!

“She’s hungry, and there are no snacks in the car,” Ingrid says with a dry look. “Poor parenting, in my opinion. There should always be snacks.”

I snort at that. We are a very snacky group. “We ate them all on the way here.”

Thatcher chuckles before turning his hat backward and bending down to be at eye level with Arwen. “We did, and alsomalyshonukis always hungry, yes?” Thatcher says and signs.

Arwen nods eagerly, but then I watch as she looks over his shoulder, and her eyes go wide. I quirk my brow before she excitedly signs,Baba!

My breath gets caught in my throat, but before I can turn and see which Baba it is, I hear a body hit the floor.

Yep, my mom fainted again.

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